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Pneumonia, flu and shingles all affect seniors disproportionately to the rest of the population. These vaccine-preventable diseases account for more than 50,000 deaths annually in the U.S., according to the Alliance for Aging Research in its newly released "The Silver Book." It attributes the cost of treating infectious diseases in seniors to 15 percent of all health care expense. The aging process makes people more vulnerable to disease, and they may also have a chronic disease, such as asthma or heart disease, which lowers immunity. As a general guideline, the Virginia Department of Health recommends annual flu shots for everyone over the age of six months, but it reserves...

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Pneumonia, flu and shingles all affect seniors disproportionately to the rest of the population. These vaccine-preventable diseases account for more than 50,000 deaths annually in the U.S., according to the Alliance for Aging Research in its newly...

Keith Richards' autobiography "Life," which was published in paperback last month, contains some nuggets of special interest to Hampton Roads rock fans. One particular scene in the book relates to the Rolling Stone's 1975 show at Hampton...

Tonya McKinney couldn't wait to get her children vaccinated against the human papilloma virus (HPV). After attending an HPV conference in 2006, the Hampton Roads organizer of Making Strides Against Breast Cancer fundraiser wanted the protection for both...

LONDON (Reuters) - Antibodies to a high-risk type of a virus that causes mouth and throat cancers when transmitted via oral sex can be detected in blood tests many years before onset of the disease, according to a World Health Organisation-led team of...

An advisory panel to the Food & Drug Administration has recommended approval of a new sleep drug that targets the brain's wakefulness centers, but suggested the agency should consider a dose of the drug, called suvorexant, lower than...

Heart patients who used common pain relievers called NSAIDs even briefly are at much higher risk of having a repeat heart attack or of dying than those who stay away from the drugs, which include such widely used over-the-counter medications as...

Assistant football coach Mike McQueary has been placed on administrative leave, and fired coach Joe Paterno has hired a lawyer, the latest steps in the unfolding Jerry Sandusky child abuse scandal that has rocked Penn State.
McQueary was the witness...

Among the hundreds of drastic and unproven weight loss plans, the controversial hCG diet may take the cake.
Discredited by researchers in the 1970s, the near-starvation diet restricts followers to 500 calories a day for six weeks. At the same time,...

LONDON (Reuters) - Contrary to popular belief, intrauterine contraceptive devices might actually protect women against developing cervical cancer even though they don't stop the infection that commonly leads to the disease, according to the results of...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - People who've ever had genital warts may have a somewhat higher risk of several types of cancer — possibly including common skin cancers, a new study suggests. The findings, reported in the Journal of Infectious Diseases,...

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain is to stop using GlaxoSmithKline's cervical cancer vaccine Cervarix from next September and will instead offer girls Merck & Co's rival product Gardasil.
The move underscores Gardasil's lead in a $1 billion-plus worldwide...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Boys 11 years and up should get Merck & Co's Gardasil vaccine to protect them against HPV infections, which can cause genital warts as well as oral, penile and anal cancers, the nation's largest group of pediatricians...

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - Roche's bone strengthening drug Boniva is as good for pain relief as single dose radiotherapy in patients whose prostate cancer has spread to their bones, according to data from a late-stage trial released on Sunday.
Trial...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - One class of drugs used to prevent wheezing and shortness of breath in people with asthma may increase kids' risk of being hospitalized for an asthma attack, according to a new analysis from the U.S. Food and Drug...

LONDON (Reuters) - All girls in Europe should be immunized against the human papillomavirus (HPV) that causes cervical cancer and current vaccine coverage rates are far too low, European Union health officials said on Wednesday. In new advice about...

CHICAGO (Reuters) - At an ill-fated press conference in 1984, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Margaret Heckler boldly predicted an effective AIDS vaccine would be available within just two years. But a string of failed attempts - punctuated by...

LOS ANGELES/GENEVA (Reuters) - Fewer people infected with HIV globally are dying as more of them get access to crucial antiretroviral drugs, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, the United Nations AIDS program said on Wednesday. The United Nations...

LONDON (Reuters) - Diabetes is running at record levels worldwide and half the people estimated to have the disease are, as yet, undiagnosed, according to a report on Wednesday. The number of people living with diabetes is now put at 371 million, up...

(Reuters) - Scientists, stymied for decades by the complexity of the human immunodeficiency virus, are making progress on several fronts in the search for a cure for HIV infections, a leading medical research conference was told this week in Seattle....